The recession may have scared off DIY developers, but money can still be made rescuing heritage homes. You just have to find the right wreck

Slideshow: Red House restoration

Georgina and Nick Maynard, with their daughter Lucy and granddaughter Cleodie, at the Red House

Photograph: Peter Willows / BNPS

The days when the country was teeming with amateur property developers,
painting every available surface a neutral colour in the hope of making a
quick buck, seem a lifetime away. The recession, we are told, killed the
cash cow that was the property market. Yet there is still a way to make a
decent profit out of homes — by restoring heritage buildings.

“This is one sector of the market where life has been made easier for some
following 2007,” says Dawn Carritt, a director at Jackson-Stops &
Staff estate agency, who is an expert on listed and historic buildings.
“There is a surfeit of skilled craftsmen, happy to work at competitive
rates, and eBay has made it possible to source materials at reasonable
prices. You also benefit when you buy a place as a cheaper broken-down wreck
and sell it as a more expensive desirable home.”